Friday Five: FTC Blogger Disclaimers

This week, the FTC attempted to soften the impact of their recent ruling extending Fairness in Advertising practices to blogger and celebrity product endorsements.

To help dispel some of the confusion surrounding what should be disclaimed, I've rounded up* some examples from several of the web's best-known and most successful bloggers. I hope they're helpful to you.

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5. FROM SETH GODIN: In the interest of full disclosure, today's post is brought to you by the No Hair Club for Men.

4. FROM JOHN CHOW: How am I supposed to disclaim content here? EVERYTHING is an ad. My head is going to explode.

3. FROM LOREN FELDMAN: I kind of hate to admit this, but the new FTC disclosure rules require me to say that the Shel puppet is actually brought to you by Shel Israel, and it's working out pretty good for him. Oy!

2. FROM ROBERT SCOBLE: For the millionth time, I don't work for Friendfeed. Swear to God. I wish I could create that much buzz for Rackspace. Maybe Facebook would buy us, too.

1. FROM VALERIA MALTONI: The new FTC regulations require me to reveal my sponsors. That's YOU. Thank you for reading Conversation Agent - and have a great Friday!

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* DISCLAIMER: Actually, I made these up, except for the last one. It's a joke! Smile - the weekend is here.

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Comments

The ironic thing is, I don't visit any of those sites but yours, so I thought they were real. I mean, I know Godin sports the dome and Scoble was in some controversy about blogs being dead and FriendFeed was the next big thing, but I didn't know these were jokes until the end.

Very cool.

Makes me wonder, though, if I should figure something out for my newest site. I'm interviewing people and giving them an opportunity to name a vendor who has done them right. It's an interview, though, so does it need a disclaimer? Maybe along the lines of those annoying, three language, "Please don't sue our movie studio because you don't like what someone says on this DVD and your feelings were hurt."